A Reading of the BEWT Proposal Documents
The purpose of this post is not to critique the idea of school improvement.
Communities always want improvement.
The purpose here is to examine how the BEWT proposal describes Kelston, its community, and its students — and what that language reveals about the future it intends to create.
The text below quotes directly from the proposal, followed by analysis.
This is not interpretation.
This is reading closely.
1. “There is a culture of underachievement at Kelston Boys’.”
This statement appears without citation, data, or source.
There is no:
NCEA performance comparison
Subject-level achievement breakdown
Longitudinal trend data
Socioeconomic index analysis
Cultural retention data
Student voice data
No evidence is provided.
Why this matters:
When a proposal begins with an unproven deficit claim, the rest of the proposal becomes a response to a problem it has invented.
This is a known rhetorical tactic in education policy:
Problem → Urgency → Intervention → Control.
(Refer: Gewirtz, Ball & Bowe, Education Reform & Power, 1995.)
2. “The school lacks discipline, consistency, and high expectations.”
Again — no evidence.
No:
suspension rate comparison
attendance metrics
classroom observation data
student wellbeing survey data
ERO finding summary
The statement is simply asserted.
This is deficit framing.
Research on Pacific and Māori schooling identifies this as a historic pattern:
Communities are described as lacking control → external authority is justified.
(Educational Research NZ, Pasifika Success Report, 2010.)
This language is not culturally responsive.
It is colonial in structure, even when spoken by brown leadership.
3. “Parents want more discipline.”
The proposal repeatedly claims to speak on behalf of parents, yet:
No transcripts of consultation are provided
No attendance numbers are stated
No demographic representation breakdown is shown
No list of who attended consultation is included
There is no evidence that Pacific and Māori parents requested a disciplinary identity shift.
What Pacific parents typically ask for — consistently across NZ research — is:
relational care
strong role models
academic confidence
cultural grounding
pathways that protect dignity and future choices
Not “forceful high-performance culture.”
Reference: Airini et al., Success for Pasifika Learners, MoE (2011)
4. “High Performance Culture”
This is the central ideological phrase of the proposal.
It appears repeatedly — without definition.
In sports psychology, high performance culture refers to environments where:
discipline is externally enforced
emotional expression is limited
identity is tied to output
failure is punished
This may be appropriate for elite athletes training in a pathway they chose.
It is not appropriate for 13–18 year olds still forming identity.
Schools are not supposed to optimize performance.
Schools are supposed to expand identity and capacity.
5. “We will introduce kindergarten rules.”
This appears in BEWT’s own documentation as the behavioural model.
The rules listed include:
“share everything”
“no hitting”
“say sorry”
“wash your hands”
This is a behaviour framework for toddlers.
Applying this to teenagers — especially Pacific and Māori teenage boys — is infantilizing.
It suggests:
The school sees the students as not yet fully human decision-makers.
This is how control is laundered as care.
6. “Banger = Forceful and aggressive athlete.”
This is BEWT’s self-chosen identity slogan.
So the proposal expresses:
Kelston is broken
We will fix it
By training boys to become forceful, aggressive performance bodies
This is masculinity-as-performance.
It is the opposite of:
indigenous masculine relational ethics
samoan fa’aaloalo
māori manaakitanga
pacific brotherhood
kaupapa rangatahi identity
academic maturation
It is colonial masculine discipline culture repackaged with Pacific faces on top.
7. Curriculum Analysis
The proposal does not demonstrate:
You cannot claim to “elevate futures” while removing pathways that create futures.
The BEWT proposal:
Invents a problem it cannot evidence
Positions Pacific and Māori boys as deficient
Offers discipline instead of belonging
Replaces identity with performance
Removes democratic governance
Narrows academic futures
This is not a misunderstanding.
This is a model.
And models have consequences.
Kelston does not need to become a place where boys learn to perform masculinity.
Kelston needs to remain a place where boys learn to become men.
